The Press: Successful Euthanasia

The sprawling megalopolis of Los Angeles, where people spend much of
their time carbonizing steaks on patio grills and driving 50 miles to
the neighborhood outdoor movie, has never been much of a newspaper
town. Of the four Los Angeles dailies still being published last year,
three lost money. Faced with such harsh reality, the owners of the
city's papers tried a drastic solution. Last winter two of the four
dailies were summarily put to death. The survivors were left with
separate morning and afternoon monopolies (TIME, Jan. 12). This double
euthanasia drew cries of dismay from all over the U.S....